Method of making wheel covers



5 1 1 t 7 A 0w .w 2 w h S 2 S m V 0 C m NE om Y m m m F o D O H T W April 4, 1961 Fllea Dec 11 1956 xiii I! 214 a IYZUT George Alberf L you 25 Z Z April 4, 1961 G. A. LYON METHOD OF MAKING WHEEL COVERS 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed Dec. 11. 1956 A? LIZ/E '12 TU T George K/berf L 7022 %4 Z'T United States Patent F METHOD OF MAKING WHEEL COVERS George Albert Lyon, 13881 W. Chicago Blvd.,

' Detroit 28, Mich.

Filed Dec. 11, 1956, Ser. No. 627,622 3 Claims. (Cl. 113-51) This invention relates generally to wheel structures and more particularly to a method for making a wheel cover member for protective retained disposition on the outer side of a vehicle wheel. Still more particularly, the present invention concerns a new development for 1mparting ornamental effects to such wheel covers.

The method of my invention concerns completely annealing a circular blank of metal during a preliminary stage in the manufacture of a wheel'cover, stretching polished surface areas of the cover to impart thereto a satiny finish, and forming and work hardening areas of the cover to provide integral retaining means rearward of the cover. g

In the manufacture of wheel covers, sheet metal strip or plate of thin gauge is drawn into desirable configuration generally comprising working the material into circular areas to impart to the cover a preferred contour. It is then desirable to polish the outer face of the cover member in order to provide a smooth lustrous finished surface highly attractive in appearance which may be readily cleaned. However, where it is desired to provide configurations in at least certain of the circular areas, the

equipment will operate economically and efliciently primarily on continuous circular areas and where there are recesses or high points or areas interrupting the circular area surfaces costly hand polishing or buffing must be resorted to instead of automatic high speed continuous mass production procedures. At least, it is generally necessary to supplement the automatic high speed polishing and buffing with manual touch-up. This is especially true where the configuration drawn is fairly shallowin depth within the permissible tensile range of the worked material of the drawn circular areas.

During working of the material into the preferred concentric circular area shape, substantial work hardening takes place, and this is especially true where substantial bending, stretching or other shaping of the material is effected incident to the shaping. Therefore, when it is desired to provide rib or spoke-like configurations and the like in generally radial direction across a selected circular portion of the cover by displacing the material of the cover out of the plane of the selected cover area, or depressing portions of the selected cover area or areas, the problem of rupturing of the material is encountered. In such an area the ribbing or depressing displacement has heretofore necessarily been carefully controlled to a fairly shallow depth to avoid rupturing the material. This imposes rather narrow limits upon the depth and thereby the ornamental appearance of the pressed portion or rib or depressed area that may be produced in the selected circular work hardened area.

To overcome the limitations above mentioned the cover is annealed prior to the formation of the depressed area. When retaining means is tobe provided integral with the cover member, the cover blank may bev anproblem arises that production polishing and buffing nealed prior to the cold working and formation of the retaining means.

An important object of the present invention is to provide sheet metal wheel covers having satiny surface finished areas.

Another object of this invention is to provide an improved method of making a wheel cover having integral retaining means and ornamental satiny finished surface stretched areas.

Still another object of this invention is to provide metal wheel covers with circular drawn areas having novel deeply drawn spoke or spoke-like rib formations or depressed area portions.

Still another object of this invention is to provide in a work hardened area of a sheet metal member such as a wheel cover, spoke or rib or depressed configurations of substantially greater depth than would normally be permitted in such an area without fracturing incident to the drawing of the configurations.

Yet another object of this invention is to improve substantially the ornamental appearance of vehicle wheel covers made from drawn sheet metal by providing the same with surface stretched areas thereby providing the cover with ornamentation of substantially contrasting appearance as compared with other surface areas on the cover.

Still another object of this invention is to attain contrasting ornamental surface appearance in a polished sheet metal surface in which all parts of the surface are initially uniformly polished to a lustrous finish.

Other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will be more readily apparent from the following detailed description of a preferred embodiment thereof taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, and in which:

Figure 1 is a side elevation of a wheel structure embodying features of the present invention;

Figure 2 is a fragmentary enlarged sectional view taken substantially 0n the line 11-11 of Fig. 1 looking in the direction indicated by the arrows;

Figure 3 is an enlarged fragmentary cross-sectional view showing a sheet metal blank in a preliminary stage of development;

Figure 4 is a view similar to Fig. 3 only showing certain blank areas in a later stage of development;

Figure 5 is a view similar to Fig. 4 only showing the marginal cover and retaining flange areas in a further stage of development; and

Figure 6 is an enlarged fragmentary cross-sectional view of my cover member in a completed state.

A wheel cover 10 (Figs. 1, 2 and 6) according to the present invention is constructed and arranged to be applied in press-on, pry-oft relation to the outer side of a vehicle wheel which may be of the conventional type having a disk spider body 11 carrying a multiflange,

drop center tire rim 12 having an intermediate generally radially inwardly facing and axially and radially out radially and axially outwardly an outer annular marginal portion 19 for overlying the tire rim 12.

Integral means are provided for press-on, pry-off reten tion of the cover 10 on the wheel. Herein such retaining means generally are of the kind shown in Figure 10 of my copending application Serial No. 561,453, filed January 26, 1956. In this instance, however, the retaining means are integral with the cover margin.

To this end, the outer marginal portion 19 of the cover has an underturned stepped flange 20 adapted in assembly to bottom against the outer side of the tire rim adjacent juncture of the intermediate and terminal rim flanges 13 and 14. Extending generally axially inwardly generally at the inner end of the continuous stepped annular flange 20 is an annular flange portion 21 that is of a smaller diameter than the axially outer surface of the intermediate flange 13 and has a series of generally axially inwardly extending finger extensions 22 provided with cover retaining terminals in the form of short and stiff radially and axially outwardly projecting terminal flanges 23 which are engageable in gripping retaining relation against the inner surface of the intermediate flange 13 under the resilient tension developed by the retaining fingers 22 and the continuous flange 21 from which the fingers extend.

To apply the cover to the outer side of the wheel, the cover is generally centered with respect to the wheel and with a valve stem 24 extending through a suitable valve stem aperture 25 in the marginal portion of the cover. Then the cover is pressed axially inwardly to effect uniform engagement of the retaining fingers 22 with the tire rim flange 13. There may be from 8 to 16 of the retaining fingers 22, as preferred.

In making the cover 10, the general method covered in my issued US. Patent 2,707,449, dated May 3, 1955, may be used.

According to such method, sheet brass of a suitable alloy or sheet steel, more especially stainless steel of suitable type, are worked by stamping and drawing into the desired form to provide the cover. It is contemplated that suitable sheet aluminum alloy may also be used. All of these materials are cold work hardenable and will take a highly lustrous polish, while the brass may be readily nickel plated and the stainless steel may be flash chrome plated, Moreover, in the cold working of the cover retaining flange structure 28, 21 and the fingers 2 2, as well as the overlying outer marginal flange 19 of the cover, a high degree of resilience is attained which is quite advantageous for embodying eflicient retaining gripping characteristics in the retaining fingers 22 and the retaining terminals 23 thereof.

In order to obtain novel, ornamental styling effect, it may be desirable to provide the cover with an arrangement of spoke-like ribs 27 separated by intermediate grooved portions 28 in a circular area of the cover body. In the present instance such circular area comprises the side wall of the crown wall 17. On the other hand, it could just as well comprise the intermediate dished annular cover portion 18. In the illustrative embodiment shown in Fig. 1, the outwardly projecting ribs 27 are disposed in generally spoke-like radial arrangement emanating from a central portion of the crown 17 and merging at their ends in an annular radially outer extremity portion 29 of the crown. The spoke-like ribs 27 are preferably substantially narrower than the intermediate dished portions 28 of the crown. Each of the spoke-like ribs 27 projects substantially outwardly beyond the dished portions 28 and has, in the present instance, a crown that is of substantial width and is arched outwardly while opposite radial ridge wall 29 merges into side wall 29a which is in turn smoothly blended into the intermediate dished portions 18.

It will be noted the depressed areas 28 are provided with a satiny finish while the spoke-like portions 27 and the cover surfaces 29 and 29a are bare and polished.

Provided in the dished area 18 are circumferentially spaced sets of symmetrical depressed or pressed in satin finished areas '30 separated by polished crest generally radially extending but inwardly dished ribs or spoke-like areas or portions 31 (Fig. 1) which are in this, instance substantially narrower than the intermediate satin finish w 4 areas 30. At their opposite radially inner and radially outer ends, the ribs 30 merge with the polish crown areas 29 and 29a and the outer marginal cover portions 19 respectively.

In view of the cold working to which the material of the crown 17 and the dished portion 18 is subjected in drawing the same to shape, relative pressing of the material would normally be carefully controlled to a limited extent in order to avoid rupturing the material. It has been found that to satisfactorily draw the areas 17 and 18 the cover blank preferably is annealed. Satisfactory annealing results can be secured by electronic induction heating or by gas heating the cover. For example, with AISI type 301 chromium-nickel stainless steel, heating of the cover body to 1750-2000 F. for approximately 7 seconds by induction heating will produce the desired annealed effect. With gas heating of the cover, the annealing temperature may be held for approximately 40 seconds after the temperature is attained following application of the gas heat.

If preferred, the cover may be annealed by a salt bath process, wherein a suitable salt is maintained in a molten condition at the proper annealing temperature. For the chromium-nickel stainless, heating to l800 F. to 1975 F. for 1 minute has been found suitable.

With other types of material, such as AISI type 430 stainless ferritic chromium steel having a lower recrystallization temperature, the annealing temperature must, of course, be held properly to not over 1500 F. Proper adjustments in this regard will therefore be in order conformable to the material employed.

According to my method, a cover blank 45 is formed to shape as is shown in Fig. 3. The blank 35 is shown as being in a preliminary shape and does not have the raised cover portions 27 and 30, nor are the retaining means completed. In the stage of development shown, the central crown area 17 and the dished area 18 have circular and annular surfaces respectively. After the blank 35 has been formed as is shown in Fig. 3, the blank is preferably completely annealed including the raised rib 36 which is between the outer margin 19 of the cover and elongated radial retaining flange 37.

Preferably, before further working the crown area 17 and the dished area 18, the cover blank 35 is polished. Through the use of suitable apparatus, the crown area 17 and the dished area 18 are drawn to final shape.

It has been found that the annealing enables much deeper drawing of the ribs than when the rib areas are not annealed. Furthermore, a highly desirable result of the deep drawing of the spoke-like ribs 27 and the pressed out portions 17, as accomplished by the described method, resides in that the areas 27 and 30, are provided with a substantially contrasting finished appearance as compared to the surfaces of the remainder of the outer face surface areas of the cover. This contrasting finished effect arises due to the stretching of the material in the ribs and pressed out areas when displacing the same from the original position of the material to the final deeply drawn displaced position thereof. Due to such stretching, the polished surface assumes a satiny, non-lustrous appearance. Where the crests of the ribs 27 are, subsequent to the drawing thereof, buffed, they will assume a polished appearance as contrasted with the sides 29 of the ribs which will retain the satiny finish. Plating of the outer face of the cover as by flash chrome plating maintains the contrasting finish of the several surface areas. Thus, there is afforded a desirable contrast in the finish of the cover emphasizing selective areas in the finished cover.

Preferably, after the cover area has been formed to final shape, the rib 36 and the retaining flange 37 which previously have been annealed, are cold worked to provide work hardened resilient retaining means. To this end, the flange.37 is..trimmed to 'providea series of circumferentially spaced finger extensions 22.

After trimming the flange 37 to provide extensions the extensions are cold worked in an axial direction away from the rib 36 to a hardness and tensile strength of tempered spring steel. To this'end, the rib 36 is elongated axially outwardly (Figure 4) and the flange is turned to extend in an axially inward direction in the manner shown in Fig. 5. Contemporaneously with the turning of the flange 37 the end of the flange 37 may be return bent to provide the short stiff terminal 23.

The hollow rib 36 is then cold worked by turning and collapsing the same generally radially outwardly-into concealing relation with respect to the finger extensions and the flange 37 is stepped to provide flange portions 20 and 21.

By the above method, the effect of the intermediate annealing step may be overcome by work hardening selective'portions of the cover to provide resilient retaining means in the form of finger like extensions 22.

It should be observed that the satin or satiny finish produced according to the present invention is something quite different from a frosted or rubbed finish. A frosted finish may be affected with an etching or sand blasting whereby particles are removed by the etching solution or by the sand grains impinged at high velocity against the surface or displaced by the force of the sand grains to form pits in the surface, whereby to effect diffusion of light striking the surface that has been treated. The result of etching or sand blasting is to bring about an alteration of the surface by externally applied means. Such means are necessarily applied after the article has been drawn to shape and in the case of intricate shapes, are very difficult to apply uniformly so as to gain a uniform finish. In any event, the superficial surface alteration mode of treatment is time consuming and expensive.

On the contrary, the method of the present invention effects an external structural change in the characteristics of the material in the worked polished surface areas whereby the non-lustrous, that is dull, satin finish results.

' into cover retainingflange structure, annealing the entire with freedom from too] marks or pits or other surface blank to transform the grain size of the blank in the work hardened contours to impart uniform softness to the material of the formed blank, polishing a surface of the formed blank inclusive of a selected contour area of the blank, uniformly stretching at least a portion of the polished surface of said contour area to effect a degree of grain displacement sufficient to break up their smooth polished orientation whereby it presents a uniformly smooth dull satiny light-diffusing appearance in contrast to adjacent unstretched polished surface areas of the blank, and forming and cold working said marginal portion into cover retaining structure.

2. The method of claim 1 including, as an additional step, plating of the surface of the cover including the stretched dull satin appearing portion ,of the cover.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the stretching involves working a pattern of contour displacements in said portion of the polished surface of the contour area, and

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,636,111 Rode July 19, 1927 2,707,449 Lyon May 3, 1955 2,757,977 Lyon Aug. 7, 1956 OTHER REFERENCES German Practice in Fabrication of Gas Turbine Blades,

by Joseph Robinson, Fiat Final Report No. 1129, pub.

by Office of Military Government for Germany (U.S.), Field Information Agency, Technical, US. Dept. of Com- ;merce; p. 2 relied upon.

'AIRD, Speed and Precision Required in Manufacture of Ford Hub Plates, The Modern Industrial Press, vol. IX, No. 6, June 1947, pp. 13, 14, 16 and18. 

